The Work Only You Can Do

Last summer I attended Quitter Conf with 200 other people pursuing their dreams. The host, Jon Acuff, challenged us, “Give yourself permission today to be your secret self.”

Just for the day. Just at the conference. Let yourself be the person you deeply wish you were.

What would you be? What would you be like? We all have this desire inside us of what we ultimately want to be, but we don’t show it.

Whatever the reason is (and there always is one), something keeps us from letting that desire transcend from our secret-self to our true-self.

When you want to be an artist and your dad reminds you “You can’t make any money doing that.”

When you want to be an athlete and your friends laugh.

When you want to start a business and people tell you your ideas stink.

…and you believe them.

Road to nowhere

The world tells you your dream is just that – a dream. Dwelling on dreams will land you in your parents basement in your 30s, but that’s about it. There’s no room for dreams in our world.

So you put it away. You quit thinking about it. You ignore the desires rooted in the deepest part of who you are in favor of a “traditional” career path.

Give up your dream and you wind up just like everyone else: boring, bored, and waiting for retirement. Click to tweet this

Your big, fat, important job

The ironic thing is you’ve got the keys to an epic life in our pocket the whole time. You were born with dreams, passions, and gifts unique to you. Your mind solves problems like no one else’s can. You create what no one else could.

You were created to fill a role that only you can fill. If you neglect it for something “safe” and “typical,” your role is left unfilled.

Put another way – you owe it to us (the rest of us) to fill your role because without you we’re one guy short.

“Don’t ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive, and go do that, because what the world needs is people who have come alive”

– Howard Thurman

Yea, so?

As the year comes to a close most people enter a sort of reflective period. We watch shows about the “Best of 2011” as we ring in the new year.

This year instead of spending time deciding which commercial was the funniest, or which new artist was the best, think about this:

The secret longing of your heart, whether it’s to build a boat and sail it, to write a symphony and play it, to plant a field and care for it – those are the things you were made to do. That’s what you’re here for.

– John Eldredge (Wild at Heart)

If that’s true, what would you be “here for”? Think about it. Write it down – if you dare!

That’s a great question Tom. I started to explore that while I was writing this, but it quickly spiraled out of control! I think Jon Acuff’s advice for helping narrow it down has been the most helpful for me: “Finding your passion (calling) is not a first date, it’s a reunion” – meaning the place to start looking is in your past. I talk more about it in this post (http://lifestoked.com/finding-your-passion/) and also point out a couple great resources at the end that have helped me.

Another stumbling block I had was that I was “filtering out” all the answers. I was waiting for an answer like “Accounting” or “Programming,” when the answer was really something more like “playing and coaching sports.”

So why am I not pursuing playing and coaching sports then? Because I’ve zeroed in on what it was about those things I was passionate about, and found ways to apply those same passions in new areas (like helping people succeed with video).

There – the longest comment I’ve ever left! (and a good idea for a follow-up post)

If you don’t know, pick something that might be it. You know many things that definitely aren’t it, so pick something else. Do that all out until you just think, “This is retarded, I don’t want to do this.”

Then pick something else. And do it all out.

It will only be one or two iterations of this process before something swoops down and kicks you in the face and says, “Hey, moron, you’ve known all the time what you want to do. You really want to …”

And then do that.

In other words, if you think you don’t know, it’s because you DO know so well that you’ve had to bury it deep to keep yourself content with working for the man. You gotta get out there and do anything (even something retarded) so you can release the real thing out from under all that buried garbage.

Mine was http://www.idearella.com. Spent 9 months on it. Then saw a math dictionary in the Museum of Natural Science gift shop. That dictionary grew legs and feet and walked over to me and kicked me in the face.

That’s an awesome point and great example Bon! This is my second (or third or forth, depending on how you count) go at this blog thing as well. My original blog was a personal-finance-coaching site. I loved it, but after a year it wasn’t the fit I hoped it would be.

Great advice though: Get started on something. Learn as you go. Love it!

Brad that is very insightful. If we stop at the level of dreaming, then we become dreamers. No dreamer has done anything better but it is only those who are ready to pursue their dreams no matter the cost who gets the ultimate prize. I really love it when a dream comes true. But mostly they need a lot of work to come through.